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.\" @(#)tty.4 8.3 (Berkeley) 4/19/94
.\"
.Dd September 7, 2019
.Dt TTY 4
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm tty
.Nd general terminal interface
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.In sys/ioctl.h
.Sh DESCRIPTION
This section describes the interface to the terminal drivers
in the system.
.Ss Terminal Special Files
Each hardware terminal port on the system usually has two terminal special
device files associated with it in the directory
.Pa /dev/
(for example,
.Pa /dev/tty03
and
.Pa /dev/dty03 ) .
.Pp
The
.Pa /dev/ttyXX
special file is used for dial-in modems and terminals.
When a user logs into
the system on one of these hardware terminal ports, the system has already
opened the associated device and prepared the line for normal interactive
use (see
.Xr getty 8 ) .
.Pp
The
.Pa /dev/dtyXX
special file is a SunOS-compatible dial-out device.
Unlike the dial-in device, opening the dial-out device never blocks.
If the corresponding dial-in device is already opened (not blocked
in the open waiting for carrier), then the dial-out open will fail
immediately; otherwise it will succeed immediately.
While the dial-out device is open, the dial-in device may not be opened.
If the dial-in open is blocking, it will wait until the dial-out
device is closed (and carrier is detected); otherwise it will fail immediately.
.Pp
There is also a special case of a terminal file that connects not to
a hardware terminal port, but to another program on the other side.
These special terminal devices are called
.Em ptys
(pseudo terminals)
and provide the mechanism necessary to give users the same interface to the
system when logging in over a network (using
.Xr rlogin 1 ,
or
.Xr telnet 1
for example.) Even in these cases the details of how the terminal
file was opened and set up is already handled by special software
in the system.
Thus, users do not normally need to worry about the details of
how these lines are opened or used.
Also, these lines are often used for dialing out of a system (through
an out-calling modem), but again the system provides programs that
hide the details of accessing these terminal special files (see
.Xr tip 1 ) .
.Pp
When an interactive user logs in, the system prepares the line to
behave in a certain way (called a
.Em line discipline ) ,
the particular details of which is described in
.Xr stty 1
at the command level, and in
.Xr termios 4
at the programming level.
A user may be concerned with changing settings associated with his
particular login terminal and should refer to the preceding man
pages for the common cases.
The remainder of this man page is concerned
with describing details of using and controlling terminal devices
at a low level, such as that possibly required by a program wishing
to provide features similar to those provided by the system.
.Ss Line disciplines
A terminal file is used like any other file in the system in that
it can be opened, read, and written to using standard system calls.
For each existing terminal file, there is a software processing module
called a
.Em line discipline
associated with it.
The
.Em line discipline
essentially glues the low level device driver code with the high
level generic interface routines (such as
.Xr read 2
and
.Xr write 2 ) ,
and is responsible for implementing the semantics associated
with the device.
When a terminal file is first opened by a program, the default
.Em line discipline
called the
.Dv termios
line discipline is associated with the file.
This is the primary line discipline that is used in most cases and
provides the semantics that users normally associate with a terminal.
When the
.Dv termios
line discipline is in effect, the terminal file behaves and is
operated according to the rules described in
.Xr termios 4 .
Please refer to that man page for a full description of the terminal
semantics.
The operations described here
generally represent features common
across all
.Em line disciplines ,
however some of these calls may not
make sense in conjunction with a line discipline other than
.Dv termios ,
and some may not be supported by the underlying
hardware (or lack thereof, as in the case of ptys).
.Ss Terminal File Operations
All of the following operations are invoked using the
.Xr ioctl 2
system call.
Refer to that man page for a description of the
.Em request
and
.Em argp
parameters.
In addition to the ioctl
.Em requests
defined here, the specific line discipline
in effect will define other
.Em requests
specific to it (actually
.Xr termios 4
defines them as function calls, not ioctl
.Em requests . )
The following section lists the available ioctl requests.
The name of the request, a description of its purpose, and the typed
.Em argp
parameter (if any) are listed.
For example, the first entry says
.Pp
.D1 Em TIOCSLINED char name[32]
.Pp
and would be called on the terminal associated with
file descriptor zero by the following code fragment:
.Bd -literal
ioctl(0, TIOCSLINED, "termios");
.Ed
.Ss Terminal File Request Descriptions
.Bl -tag -width TIOCGWINSZ
.It Dv TIOCSLINED Fa char name[32]
Change to the new line discipline called
.Fa name .
.It Dv TIOCGLINED Fa char name[32]
Return the current line discipline in the string pointed to by
.Fa name .
.It Dv TIOCSBRK Fa void
Set the terminal hardware into BREAK condition.
.It Dv TIOCCBRK Fa void
Clear the terminal hardware BREAK condition.
.It Dv TIOCSDTR Fa void
Assert data terminal ready (DTR).
.It Dv TIOCCDTR Fa void
Clear data terminal ready (DTR).
.It Dv TIOCGPGRP Fa int *tpgrp
Return the current process group the terminal is associated
with in the integer pointed to by
.Fa tpgrp .
This is the underlying call that implements the
.Xr tcgetpgrp 3
call.
.It Dv TIOCSPGRP Fa int *tpgrp
Associate the terminal with the process group (as an integer) pointed to by
.Fa tpgrp .
This is the underlying call that implements the
.Xr tcsetpgrp 3
call.
.It Dv TIOCGETA Fa struct termios *term
Place the current value of the termios state associated with the
device in the termios structure pointed to by
.Fa term .
This is the underlying call that implements the
.Xr tcgetattr 3
call.
.It Dv TIOCSETA Fa struct termios *term
Set the termios state associated with the device immediately.
This is the underlying call that implements the
.Xr tcsetattr 3
call with the
.Dv TCSANOW
option.
.It Dv TIOCSETAW Fa struct termios *term
First wait for any output to complete, then set the termios state
associated with the device.
This is the underlying call that implements the
.Xr tcsetattr 3
call with the
.Dv TCSADRAIN
option.
.It Dv TIOCSETAF Fa struct termios *term
First wait for any output to complete, clear any pending input,
then set the termios state associated with the device.
This is the underlying call that implements the
.Xr tcsetattr 3
call with the
.Dv TCSAFLUSH
option.
.It Dv TIOCOUTQ Fa int *num
Place the current number of characters in the output queue in the
integer pointed to by
.Fa num .
.It Dv TIOCSTI Fa char *cp
Simulate typed input.
Pretend as if the terminal received the character pointed to by
.Fa cp .
.It Dv TIOCNOTTY Fa void
This call is obsolete but left for compatibility.
In the past, when a process that didn't have a controlling terminal
(see
.Em The Controlling Terminal
in
.Xr termios 4 )
first opened a terminal device, it acquired that terminal as its
controlling terminal.
For some programs this was a hazard as they didn't want a controlling
terminal in the first place, and this provided a mechanism to
disassociate the controlling terminal from the calling process.
It
.Em must
be called by opening the file
.Pa /dev/tty
and calling
.Dv TIOCNOTTY
on that file descriptor.
.Pp
The current system does not allocate a controlling terminal to
a process on an
.Fn open
call: there is a specific ioctl called
.Dv TIOCSCTTY
to make a terminal the controlling
terminal.
In addition, a program can
.Fn fork
and call the
.Fn setsid
system call which will place the process into its own session - which
has the effect of disassociating it from the controlling terminal.
This is the new and preferred method for programs to lose their
controlling terminal.
.It Dv TIOCSTOP Fa void
Stop output on the terminal (like typing ^S at the keyboard).
.It Dv TIOCSTART Fa void
Start output on the terminal (like typing ^Q at the keyboard).
.It Dv TIOCSCTTY Fa void
Make the terminal the controlling terminal for the process (the process
must not currently have a controlling terminal).
.It Dv TIOCDRAIN Fa void
Wait until all output is drained.
.It Dv TIOCEXCL Fa void
Set exclusive use on the terminal.
No further opens are permitted except by root.
Of course, this means that programs that are run by root (or setuid)
will not obey the exclusive setting - which limits the usefulness
of this feature.
.It Dv TIOCNXCL Fa void
Clear exclusive use of the terminal.
Further opens are permitted.
.It Dv TIOCFLUSH Fa int *what
If the value of the int pointed to by
.Fa what
contains the
.Dv FREAD
bit as defined in
.In sys/fcntl.h ,
then all characters in the input queue are cleared.
If it contains the
.Dv FWRITE
bit, then all characters in the output queue are cleared.
If the value of the integer is zero, then it behaves as if both the
.Dv FREAD
and
.Dv FWRITE
bits were set (i.e. clears both queues).
.It Dv TIOCGWINSZ Fa struct winsize *ws
Put the window size information associated with the terminal in the
.Va winsize
structure pointed to by
.Fa ws .
The window size structure contains the number of rows and columns (and pixels
if appropriate) of the devices attached to the terminal.
It is set by user software and is the means by which most full\&-screen
oriented programs determine the screen size.
The
.Va winsize
structure is defined in
.In sys/ioctl.h .
.It Dv TIOCSWINSZ Fa struct winsize *ws
Set the window size associated with the terminal to be the value in
the
.Va winsize
structure pointed to by
.Fa ws
(see above).
.It Dv TIOCGQSIZE Fa int *qsize
Get the current size of the tty input and output queues.
.It Dv TIOCSQSIZE Fa int *qsize
Set the size of the tty input and output queues.
Valid sizes are between
.Dv 1024
and
.Dv 65536
and input values are converted to a power of two.
All pending input and output is dropped.
.It Dv TIOCCONS Fa int *on
If
.Fa on
points to a non-zero integer, redirect kernel console output (kernel printf's)
to this terminal.
If
.Fa on
points to a zero integer, redirect kernel console output back to the normal
console.
This is usually used on workstations to redirect kernel messages
to a particular window.
.It Dv TIOCMSET Fa int *state
The integer pointed to by
.Fa state
contains bits that correspond to modem state.
Following is a list of defined variables and the modem state they represent:
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width TIOCMXCTS -compact
.It TIOCM_LE
Line Enable.
.It TIOCM_DTR
Data Terminal Ready.
.It TIOCM_RTS
Request To Send.
.It TIOCM_ST
Secondary Transmit.
.It TIOCM_SR
Secondary Receive.
.It TIOCM_CTS
Clear To Send.
.It TIOCM_CAR
Carrier Detect.
.It TIOCM_CD
Carrier Detect (synonym).
.It TIOCM_RNG
Ring Indication.
.It TIOCM_RI
Ring Indication (synonym).
.It TIOCM_DSR
Data Set Ready.
.El
.Pp
This call sets the terminal modem state to that represented by
.Fa state .
Not all terminals may support this.
.It Dv TIOCMGET Fa int *state
Return the current state of the terminal modem lines as represented
above in the integer pointed to by
.Fa state .
.It Dv TIOCMBIS Fa int *state
The bits in the integer pointed to by
.Fa state
represent modem state as described above, however the state is OR-ed
in with the current state.
.It Dv TIOCMBIC Fa int *state
The bits in the integer pointed to by
.Fa state
represent modem state as described above, however each bit which is on
in
.Fa state
is cleared in the terminal.
.It Dv TIOCSFLAGS Fa int *state
The bits in the integer pointed to by
.Fa state
contain bits that correspond to serial port state.
Following is a list of defined flag values and the serial port state they
represent:
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width TIOCFLAG_SOFTCAR -compact
.It TIOCFLAG_SOFTCAR
Ignore hardware carrier.
.It TIOCFLAG_CLOCAL
Set the
.Xr termios 4
.Dv CLOCAL
flag on open.
.It TIOCFLAG_CRTSCTS
Set the
.Xr termios 4
.Dv CRTSCTS
flag on open.
.It TIOCFLAG_MDMBUF
Set the
.Xr termios 4
.Dv MDMBUF
flag on open.
.El
.Pp
This call sets the serial port state to that represented by
.Fa state .
Not all serial ports may support this.
.It Dv TIOCGFLAGS Fa int *state
Return the current state of the serial port as represented
above in the integer pointed to by
.Fa state .
.El
.Sh COMPATIBILITY
Two ioctls are maintained for backwards compatibility.
They provide methods to get and set the current line discipline,
but are not extensible.
.Bl -tag -width TIOCGWINSZ
.It Dv TIOCSETD Fa int *ldisc
Change to the new line discipline pointed to by
.Fa ldisc .
The old list of available line disciplines are listed in
.In sys/ttycom.h
and are:
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width TIOCGWINSZ -compact
.It TTYDISC
Termios interactive line discipline.
.It TABLDISC
Tablet line discipline.
.It SLIPDISC
Serial IP line discipline.
.It PPPDISC
Point to Point Protocol line discipline.
.It STRIPDISC
Starmode Radio IP line discipline.
.El
.It Dv TIOCGETD Fa int *ldisc
Return the current line discipline in the integer pointed to by
.Fa ldisc .
.El
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr stty 1 ,
.Xr ioctl 2 ,
.Xr tcgetattr 3 ,
.Xr tcsetattr 3 ,
.Xr ttyaction 3 ,
.Xr pty 4 ,
.Xr termios 4 ,
.Xr ttys 5 ,
.Xr getty 8 ,
.Xr linedisc 9
.Sh HISTORY
A console typewriter device
.Pa /dev/tty
and asynchronous communication interfaces
.Pa /dev/tty[0-5]
first appeared in
.At v1 .
Separate dial-out device files were implemented in SunOS 4.
They were cloned by
.An Charles M. Hannum
for
.Nx 1.4 .